Why We Homeschool? Part 2

Family First.
I have heard the question posed whether family has become an "idol" in segments of the homeschooling community. Have home schooling advocates sometimes focused TOO much on their own families to the point that they are of no use to anyone else? I suppose this can be true. I suppose it can also be true that some people are so focused on work and personal interests that they are not much use to anyone else either, including their family. Personally I see more families that struggle to find quality time together than I do the opposite (is there really any such thing as too much quality family time anyway?).

Anything can become an idol in our life and it's something we for sure need to contemplate. I have sometimes asked myself how I can possibly be "useful" to God in building His kingdom when I have my hands pretty full just keeping up with my own little corner of the world. God has been good enough to speak gently to me and assure me that He doesn't need me to "free" time up for Him, or worry about having myself situated hopefully, possibly, maybe in a potential place for pursuing the lost. He is much bigger than that, He knows where I am, and He knows that both my heart *and* door are open *at all times* for anyone He sees fit to bring into my path. I have learned to trust Him to make the divine appointments and He has proven to me time and time again, that He is the best Day Planner.

Here's the way I have come to see it. My life is at the centre of an ever widening circle of influence. I'm kept afloat by God's strength, purpose and sustenance. His spirit is meant to flow outwards from me to touch those around me. My nearest circle is inevitably those whose lives are most intimately connected with mine, or at least it should be, my immediate family. Ironically, society has muddled and filled and robbed our schedules to such a degree that the average family spends the majority of their time segregated and running rather than united and bonding.

The bible is clear that men of influence in the church are only qualified if they have proven themselves faithful and successful in the more intimate circle of family influence FIRST. "An elder must be.....a man whose children believe and are not open to the charge of being wild and disobedient." Titus 1:6 Wow. That's heavy. After all, we can do our best and whose to say how our kids turn out, right? I mean, they have their own free will, they will have their own personalities and make their own choices right? Will it really be our fault as parents if they choose wrongly? I don't know about that, all I know is we are called to be diligent, called to "train them up in the way they should go" and assured that if we do this diligently from an early age, when they are old they will not depart from it. Yes God can keep them and draw them to Himself despite our failures, but as parents you can bet your bottom dollar that we are going to make sure that we are doing everything in our power to train them up in the way that they should go, since He calls us to.

Personally, I am convinced that the conscience is formed in the earliest of years and that is one of the biggest reasons I believe in home education. We don't want peers, strangers, the world, public text books and television forming our children’s conscience. We want their consciences to be formed through the hearing of the word, the discussing of the word, careful and constant training through one on one interaction with the people who care more about their consciences and world view than anyone else possibly could. Their parents.

Also, rather than training our children "defensively" (as they're out there, in the trenches of society, one by one as the punches come, deal with them) we wanted to be able to train "offensively" (inform them of the punches to come, discuss right and wrong before the temptation/trial/situation arises, and play the primary role in the formation and strengthening of their moral conscience and worldview so that as situations arise they are informed and stolid about what they believe and what they should do.

I think the family first concept is kind of like the "be faithful in the small things first" concept. Not that raising kids is a small thing by any means, but in the grand scheme of life, it's the mundane, every day, day in and day out "normalcy" of your life. You are focusing on those "nearest" you rather than on big dreams. Why? Maybe because in order to truly influence those "nearest" you, you need to be on the ball! Others see you PART of the time, your family sees you ALL of the time. Parenting may seem at times like the monotonous "small things" but just remember the old Nitty Gritty Dirt Band song... "from small things baby, big things one day come!"